Under pressure from the falling rupee that breached the 63 mark against the US dollar on Monday, markets extended their losses witnessed on Friday.

On Monday, the benchmark Sensex at the BSE fell further by 290.66 points or 1.6 per cent to close at a four-month low of 18,307.5.

With Monday’s fall, the Sensex has lost 1,843 points or 9.1 per cent in the last one-month. The broader Nifty at the National Stock Exchange fell by 93 points or 1.7 per cent to close at 5,414.8.

Among major markets, Indian markets were biggest losers during the day barring Jakarta Composite of Indonesia, which fell by 5.6 per cent. Shanghai Composite of China and Nikkei 225 of Japan rose by 0.8 per cent each.

The sentiments in the market continue to remain weak and buyers are staying away from the market. While there has been no major sell-off, absence of buyers from the market is leading to the fall. As per the provisional data at the BSE, FIIs sold a net of Rs 680 crore worth of Indian equities on Monday.

“The hopes of a recovery are fading in the market and there are no buyers. The banking sector is under great stress as their provisioning requirement is expected to increase progressively,” said Pankaj Pandey, head of research at ICICI Securities.

On Monday, the large caps fell more than the mid cap and small caps as foreign investors sold their holdings in index futures. While BSE 100 fell by 1.7 per cent during the day, the mid cap and small cap indices fell by 1.4 and 1.1 per cent respectively.

Banking and auto sector stocks fell sharply on rising base rates by banks and no rate cuts in the horizon.